LIBRI DI STEFANO SOLARI

After unification (1861) Italy had to face a badly integrated and oddly struc-tured financial system as well as some fragmented or lacking institutions. The fi-nancial position of the country was characterised by double deficit in public and external balance. That caused several monetary and financial difficulties. In par-ticular, monetary and banking institutions had to be step-by-step integrated and reorganised to support economic development in this new economic space. Luigi Luzzatti has been one of the main protagonists of this process of institution build-ing. Besides his commitment with trade tariff negotiation and a variety of initiative in industry and environmental protection, he dedicated a wide effort to monetary institutions. He was one of the main supporters of the "Latin Monetary Union", which lasted from 1865 to 1928 and contributed to reforms dealing with the prob-lem of the plurality of emission banks and of their control. Luzzatti also engaged in the development of "popular banks" to contribute to the structuring of the credit system from the bottom.

The work of Leopold Kohr has attracted attention from social scientists in the field of international political studies, but few political economists have studied his theoretical argument in detail. Few students have tried to unite economic and polit-ical arguments to understand his contribution in a more analytical way. We will argue that Kohr’s principal theory (diseconomies of scale) was inherently econom-ic, an attempt to elaborate on the concept of scale in a broader perspective and in a more complex way, including the idea of quality and, in particular, power rela-tions. In this paper, we try to make sense of Kohr’s idea of decentralisation by studying his contributions from a political economy perspective. Moreover, con-clusions will be drawn that relate Kohr’s view to present-day governance problems in the European Monetary Union, in which actual governance reflects all dangers that this scholar feared.

Scopo del presente lavoro è quello di richiamare l’attenzione sul concetto di capitale sociale, elemento fondante la definizione teorica di distretto industriale. I processi in atto - globalizzazione e crescita della struttura digitale dei sistemi economici - stanno modificando radicalmente la struttura locale delle relazioni produttive tra imprese; da un lato le imprese cercano nuove reti di relazioni per poter ampliare i loro mercati di sbocco, dall’altro sono impegnate nella creazione di un nuovo vantaggio competitivo. La riflessione è centrata sull’impatto di questi cambiamenti sull’organizzazione produttiva locale e sul ruolo giocato dagli attori pubblici e privati. Viene brevemente presentato il caso studio di Montebelluna.

The growth model of the German economy draws its guiding theoretical principles from the soziale Marktwirtschaft (SMW) and the seminal work of the German economist Alfred Müller-Armack. The first part of this paper discusses the precise characteristics of German neoliberal theories and the SMW in particular. The second part explores the policy history of Argentina and Italy and the exportability of the SMW to such Latin countries. The relation between countries’ economic structure and the reforms needed to achieve such an economic order is analysed.

This volume contains twenty papers presented at the IX AISPE Conference. The conference examined the theory and practice of “economic policy” during the 20th century, focusing on both historical aspects and present experiences. Although already introduced by the mercantilist doctrines and classical theories, during the past century economic policy acquired the full status of a discipline endowed with its own theoretical corpus and a wide range of applications.

Röpke’s economic humanism and its relevance to the understanding of industrial districts (di Stefano Solari) - ABSTRACT: The thought of Wilhelm Röpke is valuable for understanding contemporary problems of market economy instability. We focus on two traits of his thought pertaining to the viability and to the ethical basis of markets. The social philosophy of Röpke is then compared with the actual features of industrial districts. The latter share some of the features of Röpke’s ideal market order and show that a decentralised non-mass society is an expedient socio-economic organization. However, the evidence provided by industrial districts confirms Röpke’s view that some order-oriented policy is required to safeguard both economic and social prerequisites of market interaction.

This volume contains the papers presented at the VIII AISPE conference dealing with the relationship between economic theory and economic institutions in historical perspective. The organizing Committee felt this was an area of the history of economics that contained numerous opportunities for new and interesting research in the following areas: the influence of economic ideas or of single economists upon the creation and the governance of specific institutions; the way the actual working and organization of institutions may have influenced the growth of economic theory and knowledge; the economic theory of institutions in historical perspective.

An open system perspective on State-economy relationships is outlined based on the concept of economic order and on Robert Delorme’s Mode of Interaction State-Economy approach. Some basic traits of the institutional set-up which framed the Italian economy will be discussed first. Then, the evolution of public finances from 1970 to 1997 will be analyzed in order to understand the relationship between them and institutional change. Public finances are understood having a complementary role to economic order and it will be shown that they display an ambivalent role: they are expression of intentional economic policies as well as they evolve as a result of endogenous mechanisms switched by external events. Finally, public spending and taxation are strictly connected with State’s legitimisation problems. Therefore, they depend strictly from the "social contract" definition. Such fact is understood as a basic determinant of the public finances crisis in Italy.